Tough Catch
by aareddig
Summary: Mark and Derek decide to take their kids fishing until something goes wrong!


Grey's Anatomy Fan Fiction

"Tough Catch"

**Introduction**

Derek Shepherd and Meredith Grey were the best man and maid of honor at the wedding of the century shortly after the plane crash. No one thought that Mark Sloan and Lexie Grey were going to make it out of the crash alive, but Derek, Meredith, Christina, and Arizona found a way, despite all their injuries to stabilize Lexie and Mark until help arrived. It took them months to recover from the traumatic injuries they sustained when their plane took a turn for the worst and crashed in the middle of the forest.

After their recovery, Lexie and Mark decided that they would rather get married today and struggle with their issues than waste another day trying to decide if they were meant to be together. Lexie wanted a huge wedding because that is what she always dreamed of and with being in the hospital for so long, she had plenty of time to plan. Derek and Meredith's daughter, Zola, was the flower girl. Lexie had chosen Christina, Arizona, and Callie to be bridesmaids next to Meredith. Other than Derek as the best man, Mark had picked Avery, Chief Webber, and Alex to be his best men.

The wedding was beautiful and shortly after the marriage, Mark and Lexie had found out they were expecting a baby. Within three years, they had two children, Charlotte, who was their oldest, and Liam, who was just born when they built a house next to Meredith and Derek. With the settlement money from the crash, Derek and Mark had built two houses next to Derek's and Meredith's. One for Mark and Lexie and the other one for Arizona and Callie, so Mark could always be with his daughter Sofia.

12 years later, Mark, Lexie, Derek, Meredith, Callie and Arizona were always together outside of the hospital. They had enough yard space to let the kids run around together and enjoy themselves. Zola, who was now 16, enjoys hanging out and talking about boys with Sofia, 15 and Charlotte, 14. The three of them do not like playing with their brothers at all because they always try to get them to do weird things like eat worms or dog poop. Liam and Bailey, both 12, are typical boys who enjoy the outdoors and tricking their sisters. A few times the boys told the girls that their mom's had made a fresh batch of chocolate cookies that she wanted them to try. Charlotte actually believed them and tried the cookie. The boys ran off laughing and screamed that was dog poop! Since then, the girls really despise the boys and never believe anything they say.

Derek and Meredith are both successful Neurosurgeons. They have found a cure for Alzheimer's disease with help from the money they received from the plane crash. Mark is retired due to the injuries he sustained in the plane crash. Lexie and Arizona are both working on the Pediatric floor at Seattle Grace Hospital and Callie has become a world class orthopedic surgeon who is the personal surgeon for all the Seattle sports teams. She is the best at what she does and is currently working on a study to come up with other ways to replace ACL's in athletes.

**Chapter One- The Fishing Trip**

"Dad, can we go fishing today?" Bailey asks Derek.

"Yes, please Uncle Derek? You and daddy haven't taken us fishing in forever." says Liam.

"Alright, alright." says Derek. "Go get your mothers and sisters. I'll get Mark and the bait. We will all go fishing down in the creek. Make sure you boys grab your fishing supplies and tell your sisters to grab theirs too."

"Ok." Both boys say at once.

Bailey and Liam race to Bailey's house where Meredith and Callie are cooking lunch. They both look around and Liam says, "Where is mom?"

"Liam, remember, your mom's working today with Aunt Arizona on a special baby. They will be home after dinner."

"That's right. Well we all need to get our fishing stuff. Daddy and Uncle Derek are taking us fishing! Tell the girls to get their stuff and we will meet them down at the creek!" Liam says excitedly.

"Okay. We will meet you there." Callie replies to the boys.

The boys rush off in such a hurry, that Meredith can't even tell them to put on a jacket because it is a bit chilly but the boys don't seem to care. They are so excited to go fishing that they almost trip down the steps.

By the time Meredith, Callie and the girls got down to the creek, Bailey, Derek, Mark and Liam had already caught five fish!

"Geez boys! Don't you want us to catch anything?" Zola says rolling her eyes. "Mom made us come down here but by the time we get our fishing stuff ready there won't be any fish to catch."

"Don't worry Zola. I am going to teach the boys a new way to fish." Mark replies as he is getting in the water. "Alright boys, this is called noodling. What you do is stick your hand in what you think is a catfish's nesting hole and wait for it to grasp onto your hand."

"Mark, do you really think this is a good idea? I don't want the boys to stick their hand into a nesting hole. They could get their arm bit off!" Meredith says to Mark.

"It will be fine Meredith. I am going to show them first and then I will teach them how to do it correctly without getting bitten."

"Well I don't want to hear you complaining whenever we have to take you to the hospital because you got your arm bitten off for this dangerous fishing that you probably saw on TV." Meredith says to Mark before she sits down to watch.

Mark slowly walks into the creek towards a deep area. He tells the boys that you are to first stick your hand down in the water to feel for a hole that you can stick your hand in. Within seconds he is screaming. The boys think he is serious until Mark starts laughing and brings his hand back to the surface.

"You almost had us fooled Daddy."

"Yeah Uncle Mark. Good one! Now get to fishing!" Bailey says laughing.

Mark sticks his hand back down into the hole and waits for a bit. This time, he really is screaming and his hand is moving frantically around outside of the water with a large catfish attached.

"THIS FISH WILL NOT LET GO!" Mark says screaming!

All three girls are screaming bloody murder and the boys are so fascinated that he has a fish attached to his arm that they don't even wonder if it is hurting him. Callie comes running over quick and tries to get the fish to let go by grabbing his jaw and squeezing tightly. This fish has not intent of letting go anytime soon.

"We can either cut the fish off and risk cutting off part of your arm to keep from it getting infected or we can race you to the hospital and put you and the fish under to remove it." Callie says.

"I don't care but get this fish off of me and call my wife!"

"Liam or Charlotte, go call the hospital and get your mother. Tell them it is an emergency and you need to talk to her immediately!" Meredith says. "We are going to get him to the hospital. Girls, you are in charge. You know our phone number in case there is an emergency. Get back up to the house and don't leave. Here's money for pizza. I don't know how long we will be gone!"

**Chapter Two- Where do we go from here?**

Derek and Meredith got the car ready as Callie carries Mark to the car. The fish is still flopping around on his arm but very much alive and hanging on. Once they are in the car, Mark is screaming and Derek is driving as fast as he can to Seattle Grace Hospital. The hospital already knows they are coming because Charlotte got a hold of her mother. Lexie was in such a panic that she ran out of the Operating Room and left Arizona to finish the surgery. Luckily, Alex was watching the surgery in the gallery and quickly ran down.

Lexie was waiting for them when they got to the hospital but Mark was in and out of consciousness due to the amount of blood he was losing. The fish had not let go but was actually tightening his jaw and still putting up a fight. Callie took charge as soon as they got there and had Jackson Avery paged to the Operating Room to assist her. He was the best plastic surgeon since Mark.

"What happened?" Lexie asks as they are rushing to the Operating Room.

"Mark decided it would be cool to teach the boys how to noodle. The boys thought it was so cool even after Mark got the fish stuck on his hand." Meredith tells Lexie.

"Are you kidding me? Why would he think that our boys need to learn how to noodle? Didn't you stop him Meredith? "Lexie says screaming.

"I tried Lexie, he didn't want to listen to me and Derek just let him do it."  
"Don't get me involved." says Derek. "I was just trying to enjoy a nice afternoon of fishing with the boys."

"SHUT UP! All of you. We have to get him to the OR stat and you guys arguing isn't helping. I am going to go save his life. I will keep you updated as soon as we know anything." Callie says rushing Mark away and leaving Lexie, Meredith and Derek waiting in the hallway.

In the Operating Room Callie and Avery quickly had Mark put to sleep to try and figure out what to do with this fish. Avery quickly thought that they could cut the fish length wise in hopes to loosen the grip. He quickly got a scalpel and cut from the back of the fish's jaw to the tip of his tail. The fish was still holding on. Callie cut the other side just as fast and the fish fell down to the floor in two pieces with the guts falling out on the way down.

"Finally!" Callie said. "Now let's get down to cleaning up his arm. I am pretty sure it is broken and will need a rod put in. That fish really was chomping down on his arm. He must have really pissed him off. You are going to help me put the rod it but it is your job to make sure you will never see the scar. You know how Mark is about scars."

As soon as Callie finished speaking Mark started to crash. "Get the crash cart quick!" Avery screamed at the nurse. "He's losing too much blood. We need to hang more blood! Intern quick, go get two bags of A- blood! Hurry, he's coding! Call in Christina Yang while we get him back! She may have to open him up!"  
Callie was just staring at Mark who was coding on the table.

"Callie, you have to breathe. I know this is the father of your child but his wife and best friends are waiting for you to get him back on his feet. They will never forgive you if they found out you froze in the OR when he was coding! I know you have been through this before with George, but we have to save him! We have to." Avery was freaking out! "I can't do this alone."  
Callie got back to focusing and starting doing compressions on Mark. He started breathing again on his own but they knew they had to close his arm quickly and would have to go back in once Christina fixed his heart. Christina rushed in and asked what had happened. "I don't know. He just coded. He lost a lot of blood while the fish was attached to his arm, but we didn't think anything was wrong with his heart." Avery said.

Christina quickly opened him up and noticed that he had valve that needed repaired in his heart. "We would have never found this if that fish didn't bite his arm. He could have died later. He should be thankful that he was stupid enough to put his hand down in that fish's nest. This will be a quick repair and then you should be able to fix his arm. This is going to leave a big scar though but it will save his life. He will thank us later."  
Yang fixed his heart and found that it was working fine so she gave Callie and Avery the okay to open up his arm and fix it.

**Chapter Three- The Rush**

Avery and Callie cut an incision into Mark's arm right where the fish bit him. They had to work quickly if they wanted to be sure that he didn't lose any more blood. Once they got in and were able to look at his arm, Callie noticed that it had torn his Flexor Carpi Ulnaris, the largest muscle in his forearm which flexes the hand. Without fixing this muscle, Mark would not be able to move his hand correctly every again.  
"We have to fix it. Find a cadaver's muscle that we can use to put in his arm. I would hate to have to cut his leg to get a new muscle. Stat! You have ten minutes to find me a new muscle!" Callie says to an intern.

"Callie, what do you want to work on while we wait for the muscle?" Avery asks.

"Let's clean up the area around the muscle and prepare the muscle for repair. We should probably take the whole thing out." Callie replies.

For ten minutes, Callie and Avery were working frantically trying to get the muscle area cleaned up for the new muscle to be put in. Suddenly, the OR door opens and in walks Derek with a new muscle.

"What are you doing here Dr. Shepherd? I thought you were with your wife and Lexie in the waiting room?" Avery says.

"I can't just sit out there and wait when my best friend is in here on the Operating table because of something stupid! I needed to help. I saw the intern running and asked them what the problem was. As soon as they said what was wrong, I went down to the morgue and got the cadaver muscle from one of my patients that died yesterday. He said before he died that he wanted his body to be donated to science. This is science, helping fix a man's arm and I knew his muscle would fit in Mark's body so I quickly removed it." Derek said. "Now let's get this into his arm!"

Callie worked for an hour making sure all parts of the muscle were attached and working properly before she closed him up. Avery made sure that the stitching was perfect to Mark's liking. Derek took him off to recovery while Callie and Avery went to talk to Lexie.

When they got to the waiting room, Lexie was crying because the surgery had been taking so long and the kids kept calling her to try and check up on their dad but Lexie hadn't heard anything. She was relieved when she saw Avery and Callie standing there and ran up to them.

**Chapter Four- The calm after the storm**

Avery and Callie walk up to Lexie and start explaining everything that had happened to Mark while they were in surgery. "First we couldn't get the fish off, and once we did he was losing a lot of blood so he coded. Turns out he had a tear in his heart that had to be fixed. Christina came in and quickly fixed it before we started working on his arm. He ended up having a torn muscle and we had to give him a cadaver muscle for his arm. Jackson did the best he could to make sure the scar will be as invisible as possible." Callie said. "He should be waking up in no time. We will take you to see him."

"Meredith, can you call the kids? I want to go see him." Lexie asked.

"Yes, I got it Lexie. Go see him and Derek and I will be right in as soon as we can get a hold of the kids." Meredith replied.

Lexie quickly walked with Callie back to the room where Mark was slowly waking up. "NEVER DO THAT AGAIN!" She yelled at she walked in the door.

"Whoa, Whoa, slow down. Do what? Where am I am why am I in so much pain?" Mark asked.

"You decided it would be fun to stick your hand down in a hole to show your son and Bailey that you were the man. Look where it got you? You had to get a cadaver muscle put in your arm, you had open heart surgery and will be laying in this bed for weeks!" Lexie says.

"Wait? I had open heart surgery? What happened after I stuck my hand in the hole?" Mark asked.

"Well, you were bleeding out and you coded. Callie noticed there was something different going on with the monitor when you coded so called Christina in. She found that you had a hole in your heart and had to fix it." Lexie replied.

"If it hadn't been for your bite, you would have had a heart attack within weeks and based on the size of that hole, if you weren't near the hospital you would have died instantly." Christina said as she walked in the door. "How are you feeling Mark?"

"A little sore, but good under the circumstances." Mark replied.

Lexie was about to pass out as Meredith walked in. "What happened, Christina? Why does Lexie look sick?" She asked.

"Well, I was just telling Mark here how that fish saved his life! I guess Lexie didn't like that." Christiana replied.

"Lexie, sit down. Mark, the kids are on their way to see you. The boys are so excited to hear about the dead body part they put in your arm!" Meredith said. "Please make sure you tell them that it is dangerous to go noodling!"

"Yeah, yeah. They are boys, they will think it was pretty cool!" Mark replied.

"You almost died on the table Mark!" Lexie said furiously.

"Yes, but, that bite saved my life! You heard Christina. I would have died if I had a heart attack away from the hospital! You should be thanking me for sticking my hand in that hole!" Mark said.

"I may be thanking you later but today I am upset that we had to go through all that! The girls were a mess! They boys just thought it was awesome that you showed them how to noodle! Just please don't let them do it!" Lexie said.

Just as Lexie finished, in walked the kids. "Uncle Mark, that was so cool! Mom told us that you have a dead guys muscle in your arm! Can we see the scar?" Bailey asked as in walked in the door.

"I'll show you all my battle scars kids! It turns out, Aunt Callie had an awesome time during my surgery. She was having so much fun she wanted to cut into my heart too! So Christina came and cut into my heart for her! She fixed it all up!" Mark replied.

"Well that's awesome Dad! I can't wait to see them!" Liam said.

"You will see them son, but right now I need to rest! It was so good seeing all of you! I will see you tomorrow once I wake up! It has been a long day. Your mothers will take you guys home! Be good for them!" Mark said as he was slowly drifting to sleep.

"Goodnight Uncle Mark. Goodnight Dad!" Liam and Bailey both said before walking out the door.

"I'll take them home Lexie, you can stay here if you want." Meredith replied.

"It's fine Meredith. Mark needs his rest. We will see him in the morning." Lexie said.

"Alright, let's head home." Meredith said to the boys.

**Epilogue**

Mark had been in the hospital for weeks and on his first day out he promised the boys he would take them fishing, the right way. They asked the girls and Derek if they wanted to join them. Because of what had happened the last time Zola, Charlotte and Sofia had said no but Lexie and Meredith thought that they better tag along just in case. The boys ran down to the creek to try and catch a fish before their dads got there. Once they got there, the boys immediately started fishing and caught three within a matter of minutes.

"Dad, these are big fish. Can we keep them?" Liam asked.

"Sure son! I could use a good fish dinner after all that hospital food!" Mark replied. "But let me show you how to catch a real fish."

Mark slowly headed towards the water.

"What are you doing?" Lexie asked. "Didn't you learn anything?"

"Relax! I just wanted to see if I could get you going! The boys have my pole right there!" Mark replied.

They all fished for hours and caught enough fish to feed the whole family. Mark never went noodling again and the boys learned that if you want to fish, it is best to use a fishing pole and not your arm.


End file.
